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News Article

Special Ops Soldiers Capture Enemy Leaders in Afghanistan

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, June 28, 2004  Coalition special operations forces raided two anti-coalition compounds and captured two top regional enemy leaders in pre- dawn missions June 26 in southern Afghanistan, a news release from the coalition military command reported today.

The enemy leaders surrendered as coalition forces surprised the insurgents, the news release said. Captured are Abdul Hafiz Majid and Mohammed Daud, who the release identified as Taliban leaders.

In the release, Combined Forces Command Afghanistan officials said that in areas where anti-coalition forces have been removed over the past year, Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force A has spent almost $1.5 million to build schools, wells, clinics, roads and mosques to improve the quality of life for Afghans looking to the future.

More than 1,000 Afghan patients receive weekly medical care from coalition special operations medics and attached special ops personnel, including Civil Affairs doctors and physician assistants based in remote village areas in Afghanistan, the news release added.

In a written statement, coalition officials in Afghanistan condemned the June 26 bombing of a Joint Electoral Management Body bus near Jalalabad that killed two women and wounded 14 more people.

The coalition evacuated those needing hospitalization to the hospital at Bagram Air Field, the statement said. "This attack on Afghan women working to build a democracy for Afghanistan will not stop registration in the greater Afghanistan," the statement went on to say.

More than 4.5 million Afghans have registered to vote, accpording to the coalition statement. The region attacked is second only to the region around the national capital of Kabul in voter registration, with close to 600,000 registered voters, 35 percent of whom are women, the statement added.

Coalition officials used the same statement to provide details of other recent operations and events in Afghanistan:

Soldiers of the Afghan National Army deployed to Ghor province in central Afghanistan on June 24 to resolve a dispute there between rival military forces. The ANA battalion, about 200 strong, along with their embedded U.S. trainers, arrived in the provincial capital city of Chaghcharan to the cheers of the residents.

As with deployments of ANA troops to Maimana and Herat earlier this year, the ANA soldiers were able to re-assert the authority of the national government peacefully. The commander of the force deployed to Ghor province, ANA Gen. Aminullah Paktiyanai, explained that his mission was "to ensure peace and bring about security" in the capital and his troops had the resources to prevent any further fighting. "War against the Afghan National Army is war against the Afghan nation as well as against the United Nations," he added.

The Kabul Military Hospital has upgraded the medical care it provides to its patients, thanks to a multi-million dollar donation of modern equipment by the United States.

The 400-bed hospital, also known as the Chahar Sad Bastari Hospital, received 400 new beds, carts, intravenous stands, X-ray machines, film processors, six new anesthesia machines, an ultrasound machine, a defibrillator and patient monitors. Medical specialists from the United States, Turkey and Denmark are training the Afghan hospital staff on these new items of equipment.

Among the staffers at the hospital are a number of medical specialists who have either transferred from the Afghan Militia Force to the Afghan National Army or who have applied to do so.